Joost

I am in California visiting family and friends until December 26th. Right now I’m waiting for my brother to get dressed so we can go shopping, so I decided to share something from inside the walls of the lair…

A few weeks ago I was attempting to watch a movie and relax after a long day, but The Stinky Cat would not stop attacking my face with his paws (playfully). I decided to beat him at his own game, so the battle for “most annoying couch game” was on.

I won.

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PS: I haven’t written an update on Joost since July, mostly because that was the last time I noticed anything interesting that wasn’t just another “we added another channel!” update. Last week I decided that now that 2007 is almost over, I should pop by and see what else has happened…

Personally, I was more interested in finding out if Squidbillies is now available on Joost, because I still haven’t set up cable in my apartment and can only (right now) watch Adult Swim content on YouTube (it is available – yay!) …My whole issue with Adult Swim not offering ad supported full length episodes of Squidbillies on their official site is a rant for another day. Talk about missing a huge opportunity! Anyway. Back to Joost.

I pulled some screenshots as I went through my personal test in Joost and mentally noted all of my complaints. The Watching Joost Pool on Flickr is pretty inactive, but I added my shots there anyway. I’ll share what I uncovered and my thoughts on specific features later in the week.

This entry is a test to see if the blogging tool within Joost is functional.

Earlier today I tried to use Joost and it crashed four times. I reinstalled the latest version and noticed this new service.

If this does actually work, it is a smart way for Joost to assist bloggers (supporters and critics) who are reviewing their updates. I can watch Joost programs and blog about them in real time… If it works.

So, it worked. The first changes I feel Joost should make to their blogging module is to provide the option to add tags, because the default is “uncategorized”.

I see this blogging option being beneficial to more than just Joost… Besides making it easier for Joost to get free promo through bloggers, anyone who wishes to review, document, or expand on any content within Joost now has the option to do so in real time.

If Joost ever gets into the live streaming business, anyone in the world could liveblog a conference regardless of whether they were actually there in person – as long as they could watch and blog within Joost.

matrixxx1
Fri, Apr 06, 2007, 21:09
FAQ Discussions » Feature requests
A quick ‘Blog about this show’ button
A quick ‘Blog about this show’ and a ‘Read blogs about this show’ button would be pretty neat. So people can easily write about shows.

If you’re running out of friends, you can make new ones by letting people know you’ve got invites. To help with this, we’ve made a few goodies especially for you, which you can find at http://www.joost.com/share/goodies.html.

Last but not least, we invite you to enjoy the variety of new shows we’re introducing each week. This week will bring you a host of over 40 new channels in the US including Adult Swim, five new channels from National Geographic, new channels like Spike TV from Viacom, great comedy from Heavy, and classic series from Hasbro such as The Transformers. And that’s just the beginning.

Each week we’ll launch new channels – making sure you can watch what you want, when you want. So stay tuned…

If you’ve got any questions, feel free to check out our forum http://www.joost.com/forums, and don’t forget to send us feedback on what you like and things we could improve.

Enjoy, and see you on Joost!

The Joost Team
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I am awful, I know. I promised Joost invites and then life took over and I never replied back to the 5-10 or so that asked for some. Now I have no excuse, so, hit me up with First/Last name to use and email and I will send you one by the end of this weekend.

WARNING: If requests exceed…. 20, I reserve the right to send the rest later next week.

I tried to open up Joost this morning but an error message told me I needed to download the latest version. With the new version, I needed to create a user ID. After logging in, I was pleasantly surprised to see the MTV channel finally in there, but then became bored again when all I saw was Laguna Beach and Two-A-Day episodes. Oh well, one day at a time.

The look of the new version is a lot more, let’s say, polished. The widgets area seems to be more organized, and my screen wasn’t doing that jumpy thing it was with the first version. However, I do have 2 gigs of memory on my work comp so it makes me wonder if the program runs as smoothly for the average user. Another change that I hadn’t noticed before was that I can’t send Joost tokens from the website anymore, I have to do it directly through the program.

After I downloaded the new version of Joost Beta today – 0.8.1. – everything seems to be the same. I was disappointed that I still couldn’t find any MTV (USA) content.

The redesign, among other things, includes an area with “approved” screenshots to use in blogs. I assume the Joost team caught on to the fact that everyone is posting their own. It probably wouldn’t have hurt them to include screenshots of the website makeover as well.

There is also a “What’s Joost” section where there is a video explaining what Joost is about, as well as an official list of available programming. Again, it lists MTV and BET but when I search for both I get nothing.

The Joost “Coming Soon” area teases to more upcoming community features, and a Joost developer kit that will allow you to create your own widgets and share them with the community.

… I wonder if Joost plans on partnering with Play Station Home. If they don’t, someone else will.

– VOY Filmmaker Showcase features the best short films, music videos and commercials made by Latinos or featuring Latinos.

– LatinEyes is a magazine show highlighting Latin culture in the United States and abroad. From political, historical and entertainment figures, Latin Eyes highlights Latinos who are making an impact in the U.S. and around the world as well as products, places and events that shape the Latino experience.

– VOY to Hollywood features celebrity interviews, featurettes and behind-the-scenes news on movies and shows that interest Latinos.

– Hola America!, a news magazine focused on Latino personalities who are making an impact in the United States. Guest on the show have included: Eva Longoria (Desperate Housewives), Lupe Ontiveros (Desperate Housewives, Storytelling, etc), Tony Plana (Ugly Betty) Richard Riordan (Mayor of Los Angeles), Chip and Kim McAllister (Winners of Amazing Race).

– LowLos, A weekly show dedicated to Lowriders and the Lowriding culture, lifestyle.

– (IN)Pulse, A VOY original hosted weekly show on all things entertainment with a Latino twist. We take the pulse on the latest happenings in the music, film and television industry and report what’s cool to Latino youth today.”

Ok so….

This is the #1 question I keep getting from people, and since I can’t guarantee I will be able to give a more in depth report later today, here is a brief summary:

My dear readers, you have now caught on to the fact that I rarely update during the weekends. Here are some things I would definitely rather do than blog on Sat & Sun (that I happily did this weekend)

#1 Spend time with my little sister. I have mentioned before how much I enjoy being a part of Big Brother Big Sisters NYC, and at some point I plan on blogging about examples of fun activities I have enjoyed that someone else could experience with their Little Brother or Sister. You don’t have to be perfect to be a friend to a young person. You just have to be willing to share some free time.

#2 Finish up editing my short film. YES. It’s FINALLY done. After much heartache and stress, we re-recorded all the audio and re-synced everything.. Get ready to check it out this week! I also plan on submitting it to the broadband emmy competition…

#3 Hang out watching netflicks selections with my honey ❤

I was comparing notes with the previously mentioned honey the other day, and we both came to the conclusion that because of work, we each spend probably 8-10 solid hours per day on the internet. This is not counting the non work hours I spend on the internet reading blogs, gushing over fashion on streetpeeper, scouring IMDB to satisfy my current fascination with korean cinema, etc.

I feel like I am a pretty accurate example of the current average net user. All of my work is essentially done using online tools and communicating with coworkers through AIM, I find out about what’s going on in the world through blogs, online versions of news channels and magazines, (although I am addicted to the printed version of Nylon Mag), and I have met many interesting friends (dating and platonic) through craigslist. Despite all of this net activity, I would like to be able to count actual blocks of time where I am NOT on. Just a personal choice.

… But for all your joost fiends, tomorrow I plan on posting an in depth pt deux description of my exploits in joost world, include reviews of the (so far) 29 channels offered… Stay tuned!

I was given beta access early this morning, and since then have played around in it here and there…

My initial impressions are that the interface is really easy to use. I loved being able to search for video by keywords, being able to chat with friends while watching, and the video quality is awesome. I love the idea of being able to watch whatever I want, on demand, on any screen.

I plan on exploring it more later tonight (I am working, after all), but I thought I would share screenshots that I made on my lunch break: